


Red Light, Orange Light, Go

by the_rck



Category: Star Wars Prequel Trilogy
Genre: Crack, M/M, Stalking, courting gifts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-07
Updated: 2019-10-07
Packaged: 2020-11-27 00:18:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 579
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20939177
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_rck/pseuds/the_rck
Summary: After, Mace could never put his finger on the moment when his life swerved into the absurd. Jedi were not supposed to have nemesises. Nemesi? Even the word was ludicrous and implied a level of inappropriate attachment.And that was without addressing the flirtation. That part was definitely inappropriate.





	Red Light, Orange Light, Go

**Author's Note:**

  * For [DoreyG](https://archiveofourown.org/users/DoreyG/gifts).

After, Mace could never put his finger on the moment when his life swerved into the absurd. Jedi were not supposed to have nemesises. Nemesi? Even the word was ludicrous and implied a level of inappropriate attachment.

And that was without addressing the flirtation. That part was definitely inappropriate.

Mace knew that his Master and all of his Master's friends were laughing. Secretly. There was just something about how Master Myr patted Mace's shoulder and said, "Even if you figure out who he is, pretend you haven't," that told Mace that Master Myr didn't take the repeated murder attempts seriously. "It's not a very mature way of getting your attention, but it does reflect a certain... dedication to the concept."

The flowers would have been unobjectionable if they hadn't appeared in places where no one but Mace should have been able to go or where no one should have known Mace would be. The first two years, they were all dyed to match Mace's lightsaber. After that, they still matched, but they'd been engineered for the coloration instead. That had to have taken more than two years, and the calpa lilies of Arduiis had been extinct for forty five years before Mace started finding them on the bunks he was assigned for trips outbound from Coruscant.

The only benefit Mace could see from having a stalker was that the masked man wouldn't let anyone else ambush Mace. Usually. Assuming that he'd have backup that way had bitten Mace in the ass twice, so Mace now treated every mission as if he was working without support. Taking down his own opponents was much less trouble than enduring the embarrassment of having severed hands packed in ice delivered to his hospital bed while his shattered knee was healing.

By the time Mace took a Padawan, there was a betting pool about who kept sending him flowers. Mace knew, of course, both about the betting pool and about the identity of his stalker. He wasn't a complete idiot, so he'd tracked species and height and other physical features not obscured by the mask.

And, really, Sheev had wanted to be identified.

Not telling anyone had been Mace's choice. It had nothing to do with having wondered if he was wrong because what the hell was someone like Sheev Palpatine doing, prancing around with a domino mask and a red lightsaber? Mace's first gift to Sheev was a visual sonnet made entirely of shells from the beaches of Naboo. He didn't send it to Sheev's home or office, just left it where the creepy asshole had to find it if he wanted to leave another fucking lily.

There were four lilies that time. Four for unity of purpose. Mace didn't want to know why Sheev had had the three extra lilies. No, actually, he totally wanted to know. Maybe Sheev always carried extra? If not, Mace had another hole in his security because he'd been very, very careful about his preparations.

Possibly that had given him away? It was a more reassuring explanation than prescience.

Mace's second gift was sandfleas in Sheev's office carpets because, again, what the hell? A direct conversation would have worked. _Mace_ would have started with a direct conversation. If he'd been stalking someone. Which he wouldn't because Jedi, because attachment, because stalking.

Not letting anyone win the betting pool was merely petty. Sheev was Mace's personal Sith nemesis. The rest of the Order could go find their own.


End file.
